


Content as the Night is Long

by Dexthecryptid (Godtie)



Series: OMGCP Prompts [6]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M, also known as nursey might be a heavy weight but he isn't good at knowing when to stop, depictions of college level alcohol usage, he's fine it's fine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-01
Updated: 2016-10-01
Packaged: 2018-08-18 20:34:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8175131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Godtie/pseuds/Dexthecryptid
Summary: Prompt: for the five word prompt thing do "please don’t leave me alone" with nurseydexNursey drinks a bit too much at a kegster, and Dex reflects on their friendship.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Lord this prompt has been sitting in my ask box since August.

“Please don’t leave me alone”

Dex sighs. He’s sitting on the edge of the bathtub watching Nursey literally lie his face down on the toilet seat. 

“Dude, thats fucking disgusting. Pick your head up.”

“Deeeeeex.” Nursey whines in response, not moving.

Dex shakes his head, scooting along the bathtub to be closer to his teammate. “I’m not going anywhere, you idiot. Pick your head up.” He puts a hand on Nursey’s shoulder and gently tries to pull him back.

Instead, Nursey turns his head and empties more of his stomach into the toilet.

Dex leans down to rub his face, elbows on his knees. He can still hear the kegster raging downstairs. They’re lucky they’re on the team and that Bitty let them defile his toilet. Dex had been put on Nursey patrol but lost track of him for roughly ten minutes when he got pulled into diffusing a rowdy argument outside. He had found Nursey only after he had managed to down two cups of tub juice, and knew he was in for a gross night.

Nursey spits into the toilet. Dex looks up to see him staring down into the bowl. He leans over and flushes the toilet. Nursey doesn’t move, and Dex hears him sigh softly over the flush of water. Then his head begins to lower to the toilet seat again.

“Nursey, stop. I’m serious. Thats disgusting.” Dex coaxes, pulling at his shoulder again. Nursey whines in response. “I don’t care. This is basically a frat house dude. I know Bitty probably bleaches that shit, but I still don’t trust it.”

Nursey whines again but removes his face from the seat. He pouts up at Dex, wobbling slightly and eyes looking slightly distant, before firmly planting his cheek on Dex’s thigh. His arms snake around Dex’s calf and ankle and Dex finds himself only able to sigh. Nursey mutters something that Dex can’t hear.

“Nurse, why are you such a fucking idiot?” Dee’s voice isn’t harsh, but Nursey whines in response. “What made you think downing two cups of tub juice was a good idea?”

“Tastes good.” The words are both slurred together and muffled by Dex’s jeans. He realizes he can only understand them because he knows Nursey. “N’ I wanted to be drunk.”

Dex looks up at the wall as if he was sharing a look with it. “Nursey, you were already drunk when you did it.”

“Yeah but like. More drunk. Chill, Dex.”

Nursey nuzzles into Dex’s thigh as Dex wills himself not to get angry at the mention of “chill.” He takes a breath, two, before looking down at Nursey. He looks somewhat peaceful, resting on his lap, and smushing his face further into it. Dex knows that once he gets on his feet again, Nursey will be a mess. But he looks about as peaceful as Dex never feels. 

He gets jealous of that, sometimes. He realized it spring semester of freshman year. He was jealous that Nursey could afford to relax. That he didn’t have to keep himself in check, make sure he was pushing himself to be better, do better, work harder. Dex knows he’s not as bad as Jack. At least, not on the ice.

But in school? Sometimes he gets angry because he works his ass off day and night, but he still struggles with grades. He knows it’s his ADHD, he knows he can’t help it. But he also knows he hates having to ask professors for extensions because he fell behind with homework because his executive function flew out the window that week and left him to rot. He hates how he constantly has three things going on in his brain at any given moment if he’s not on his meds. He hates that he looks at Ransom, who doesn’t go to class, who acts like it’s so easy when there isn’t an impending test, who has a 4.0 and he’s struggling to keep it above a 3.0. 

So he’s jealous that Nursey doesn’t have to do that. He’s jealous that Nursey is allowed to let himself slip and not worry whether or not he’ll be able to pick himself back up. He’s jealous that Nursey didn’t have to register with disability services, and jealous that Nursey doesn’t have to deal with the guilt of approaching his professors to tell them he couldn’t do the homework when his explanations just make him look lazy, like he just didn’t want to do it.

His jealousy was a large reason they got in actual fights their first semester. It lasted into second semester as well, but over spring break he had hung out with an old friend from high school. Patricia had always been wise beyond her years. She was the person everyone would go to if they wanted actual relationship advice, whether it be romantic or platonic. They had met up to go to their town’s clam shack, and while waiting for their order to be called he couldn’t help but rant at her.

She took it all, nodding and humming at the appropriate times. Their order got called before she could reply, so it was right after they sat down when she did. 

“You’re jealous of him, Will.”

Dex had looked up from his basket, giving her an incredulous look. She went on to explain everything he knew now, everything that seemed obvious when she lay it out on the table between their meals. It was like slamming into the ice and wondering who checked you, blaming the person closest to you, only for someone to point out you tripped yourself.

Patricia had let him mull it over for a few minutes silently. Dex only stared at his basket, fingers fidgeting against each other as he thought about it. She let him process it. She was good at knowing when to do that. She spoke again when he lifted his eyes to her.

“I only have one piece of advice for you, Poindexter.”

“What?”

“Unless the other person is actively trying to make you so, jealousy is always only your own problem. It’s not fair to expect other people to fix it, and it’s not fair to project it onto other people.”

The rest of their dinner was light, gossiping about old classmates and family. But Dex had been left to think on it the rest of the week. He was left to think on the times he lashed out on Nursey when he shouldn’t have. He talked to Chowder who, while did agree with what Patricia said, also pointed out that Nursey instigates a lot. It’s not totally Dex’s fault, but how often it escalated might have been in part due to his jealousy.

He goes back to Samwell feeling like he should apologize to Nursey.

He doesn’t, because he feels that would be weird, and he doesn’t feel like he’s ready for that kind of deep conversation with Nursey yet. But he does try to be more aware of what he’s actually feeling when he gets riled up at Nursey. He stops lashing out when he realizes his anger is stemming from jealousy. It takes him until the semester after that, but he gets better at it. And they become friends.

Close enough friends where Dex now is usually the one who gets stuck on Nursey patrol. He sits up slightly and looks down at Nursey, whose nose is pushed to the side and mouth slightly open since he can’t breath through it. Dex pushes Nursey’s hair off his forehead and Nursey barely responds, only his breathing changes slightly. 

“You done throwing up?” Nursey nods. “Let’s get you over to Chowder’s room, okay? He said he was gonna crash at Cait’s tonight to make sure she gets home safe. I’ll text him to let him know we’re using his room.”

Dex manages to haul Nursey to his feet and guide him to Chowder’s bed, which Nursey unceremoniously flops down on. Dex watches as he kind of… writhes around on it, getting comfortable, ending up enveloping Chowder’s large shark plushie in a cuddle. Dex hears the party downstairs again, and he realizes he doesn’t really want to go back down. He’d rather stay in Chowder’s room with Nursey.

“You’re so fucking wasted. Move over so I can sit down.” Nursey only groans, but responds and moves when Dex begins to push him. Nursey’s head ends up in Dex’s lap when Dex starts watching vines on his phone, both boys giggling and pointed to ones they want to watch, or suggesting different viners they like. Eventually they end up on youtube because Nursey exclaims “wait, you’ve never seen history of Japan?” Nursey falls asleep first and Dex has slid down on the bed so much that he only had to alter his position slightly to lie down properly and doze off.

Dex wakes up with Nursey’s arm draped over his shoulder and his face pushed into his stomach. He lies there, allowing himself to wake up, and realizes he’s okay with it. He’s okay with being this close to Nursey. He’s okay with Nursey. And maybe he wants to be closer.

**Author's Note:**

> Shout out to tumblr user brownstone-lobsterboat for 1) being my go to head canon pal and 2) betaing this fic for me! She's great and her writing is ever greater so definitely go check her out!
> 
> I was gonna make the title a clam pun/idiom but there weren't any good ones, so I made it something in reference to another idiom that's a synonym of "happy as a clam" but changed it to night instead of day?? That was a really benign piece of info but I really like naming fics and I like sharing how I got there so. Yeah.
> 
> Want to send me a prompt, talk about this fic, or chat with me in general? Find me at [Dexthecryptid](http://dexthecryptid.tumblr.com) on tumblr!


End file.
